ROCKFORD - A former public official's private property will soon be purchased for public use.

Winnebago County Forest Preserve District commissioners voted 4-2 Tuesday in favor of an agreement to buy a vast wetland owned by Kathy Wise Winters and former state Rep. Dave Winters. Commissioners Randy Olson and Cheryl Maggio voted against. Gloria Lind was absent.

The property spans more than 520 acres at the confluence of the Sugar and Pecatonica rivers in Shirland. It's home to several threatened plant species and about 150 species of birds. It is a migratory stop for the federally endangered whooping crane.

"It's absolutely the most important piece of property we could have possibly gotten," said Commissioner Audrey Johnson, who leads the board's land acquisition committee.

A grant from the Illinois Clean Energy Community Foundation and a donation from Ray and Char Ferguson

will be used to purchase the property. No tax dollars will be used.

Ray, a Rockford attorney and Char, a former teacher, have a history of supporting the district. The two both support Macktown Living History, located at the Macktown Forest Preserve, Ray as president of the board and Char as a volunteer education coordinator. In 2007, Ferguson purchased a 76-acre farmland near Pecatonica and held it until it could be turned over to the district at cost. The land expanded Seward Bluff Forest Preserve. Ray grew up on a farm in northwest Winnebago County and both believe firmly in preserving land along waterways for wildlife habitat and for people to enjoy.

"We've been looking for a long time for something special that would be important enough to contribute to," Char said. "It's a very unique property."

The district will pay $1,904 an acre for the land per the agreement, Executive Director Mike Holan said. A final survey of the land will determine total acreage, which is between 522 acres and 526 acres, he said. That would bring the total cost to about $1 million.

The majority of the land cannot be developed whether the district purchased it or not. That's because about 460 acres are secured in the Department of Agriculture's Wetland Reserve Program. The federal government paid Dave and Kathy Winters about $937,000 in late 2003 to compensate them for turning cropland into a natural area. They decided to sell the land because they are divorcing.

Olson said the land's protected status and the unknown long-term costs to maintain it and open it to the public led to his no vote.

"We have to comply with handicap parking, we have to maintain trails," Olson said. "That cost is an unknown right now. It could run into hundreds of thousands of dollars."

Holan said it should cost less than $5,000 in man hours to maintain the property, which will include mowing, prescribed burns and storm cleanup. The district will pursue grants and sponsorships to fund construction of a parking lot, he said.

Page 2 of 2 - The district wanted to purchase the land, despite its already protected status, so it can open the property to birders and other nature lovers. District officials expect it to be a tourist attraction, especially for bird watchers because of the rare avian species on site.

"Birders from all over the country will come, I guarantee it," Johnson said. "It will be the finest piece that we've acquired in a long, long time."

The property likely won't open to the public until 2015 after the district can build parking, Holan said.

It will be the second-largest acreage purchased in the district's history, behind the 784-acre Blackhawk Springs acquisition in 1978. The purchase pushes the district's total holdings beyond 10,000 acres.